CIRCA LATE 2ND-EARLY 1ST MILLENNIUM B.C.

This unusual axe head has addorsed lions along the shaft, both with their heads projecting outwards and their mouths open revealing fangs. Below the shaft is an ibex with long ridged horns that rise up and frame the shaft hole. Beneath the ibex projects the blunt curving blade, with a raised and hatched border at the join serving as the groundline, and terminating in an animal head at the back. While on loan at the Brooklyn Museum, it was suggested that this axe head was Elamite, but it may be that this originates from the greater Iranian world rather than specifically from within the Elamite sphere.